


Observations

by Kit_SummerIsle



Category: Transformers: Prime
Genre: Dark, Musing, Post-War, Tactile, Violence, dub-con, fields, mind-games
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-21
Updated: 2014-09-05
Packaged: 2018-02-09 19:46:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1995594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kit_SummerIsle/pseuds/Kit_SummerIsle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Optimus has plenty of time to observe Seeker heels...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Day

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Lj tf-rare-pairing](http://tf-rare-pairing.livejournal.com/) fanwork-a-thon challenge.
> 
> The verse is mostly TF:Prime; a post-war scene with very little background. It is my first TFP fic and probably mangled it somewhat and mixed other ideas into it... but I kinda liked the mood of it, so decided to post.

Title: Observations  
Universe/Continuity: TF:Prime  
Rating: M  
Warnings: offscreen violence, canon character death, dark themes, dub-con  
Characters: Starscream, Optimus Prime  
Prompt: "Seeker heels"

 

Starscream walked a lot. During meetings, during trysts, when he was with his Trine, his underlings, with the courtiers; when he was angry, frustrated, gleefully happy, immersed in plotting, or simply thinking… his heels were always pattering on the marble floor, the sound of their slender but sturdy metal almost musical as it left the surface with a tiny clink, soared in the air and dropped to a different spot, to tap another note into a rhythm only he could make… and hear. As he watched, sometimes he could almost, almost get that sequence, the wild, unexplainable, untameable rhythm of the Seeker’s thinking… but in the end it has always eluded him. Starscream had been, was and would always be an enigma. A fanciful mystery walking on those delicate, tall heels, so outrageously unlike their race of sturdy metal, deadly weapons and brutal war…

… and so unbelievably stronger than they looked in their slender grace. As they hit the floor in front of him with the unleashed power of powerful turbines, as they ground a tiny bit of scrap metal into the marble, as they supported equally slender but powerful legs that rose up like columns of graceful strength, up, beyond his present horizon, as they flaunted a ridiculously inappropriate flourish that annoyed him inexplicably for some reason… all the while they hammered home thoroughly what the Seeker was: foolish flamboyance and deadly power in one shining package, bound together with a processor surpassing anything Optimus ever knew before.

That terrible processor was calm this orn, the clicking of heels a steady, collected rhythm that moved regularly like clockwork from one end of the chamber to the other and back… for the three hundredth and sixty-seventh time this orn, since he picked up a datapad from the table and his scratchy voice started to murmur unintelligible sounds to accompany the beat of his walk, creating a unique music that was, perhaps quintessentially Starscream. It was the scientist-Starscream, the most approachable and least deadly of his many faces and roles. Down to his sharp heels he was in a good mood and Optimus knew from long – far too long - experience that others would brave this mood for their own interests, daring to disturb his chamber, his solitude soon.

Maybe another set of heels, sturdier somewhat, as most Seekers appeared to be more heavyset than Starscream, the blue pair or another one, currying favour from who was technically their trine-leader, but in reality as much their absolute ruler as anymech else’s… They could never match the elegance, the arrogance or the unique song of Starscream’s heels pattering on the throne-room’s elaborate floors. They fumbled and hurried to catch up with his steady clatter, misstepped as they tried to spin around him, being close enough for his grace but far enough from the deadliness always so close to the surface. Their rhythm broke and restarted, their heels screeched on the floor as they jumped a little from time to time, in a sudden fright or carefully repressed anger… all the while their more ordinary heels circled and gravitated around those elegantly deadly, fancifully cruel pair. 

The steady clicking stopped and Optimus watched warily the suddenly still heels resting momentarily halfway across the room, frozen into a half-step, into the sudden silence. Time seemed to stop and he held back his invent, realizing that he chuckled aloud at the previous mental image, disturbing the sacred music, broke a train of thought he couldn’t follow even if he tried to. The shiny, gray pedes whirled on an unseen signal, the heels hitting the marble forcefully as the sharp points turned towards him. A nanoklik of silence ensued, heavy with sudden apprehension, wrought with darkening clouds – and they took up a new rhythm, a harder step, a purposeful and heavy gait that took the Seeker towards him. At times like these Optimus swore that even their colour darkened, along with their owner’s mood.

He very much wanted to withdraw that chuckle – it was never a good idea to disturb Starscream’s thinking mood and he paid a painful price before he learned that. Apparently not enough. The pedes arrived in front of him, the heels stilled from their dance across the room. One came to a stop, then the other beside it, coming to a standstill astride in front of his face. He saw them only up to the pointy knees, as the chain was forcing his helm downwards, he nearly forgot how faces looked like… but he came to know Starscream’s moods from the way he held his legs, the way his heels clicked, the way he stood and moved. Right now, they signaled his displeasure, quickly shading into anger, then fury as Starscream was wont to do, culminating his voice breaking the standstill with a sharp cut.

“Was something… funny?” 

He wouldn’t have answered, even if he could. A slight, cautious helmshake was what he could – barely – do and he did that, lowering his glance to the heels again as they shifted and turned half away. Whether he would be punished or just earned a derisive laugh was up to the Seeker now. Maybe a pitiful existence for a former Prime to kneel on the throne-room’s floor, displayed in chains for all who came to court and fawn to the reconquered, rebuilt Cybertron’s new ruler… but it was all he had left and Optimus sometimes tried to console himself with the fact that at least the war was over, that the Seeker actually proved to be a good leader, collected all relics and they all had peace and freedom… all Autobots and Decepticons except for him.

It was still more what Megatron got. His archenemy’s frame was displayed the same way on the exact opposite side of the chamber – minus the helm and in the inglorious grays of the deactivated. The symbolism of that sometimes wracked Optimus’s processor, lacking anything to occupy itself with. Sometimes… when those heels held cruelty and madness in their rhythm, he silently wished to join him and be an empty, dead frame too, to ornament Starscream’s throne in a perfect symmetry of death and victory, a grisly memento of the past and the darker tone of the future he created. The warlord’s frame displayed the same signs of the Seeker’s fury as his, only the remaining colours of the living, faded blues and dull reds set them apart.

“Be silent then.”

Optimus’s frame slumped a bit as the heels whirled again and whatever scientific problem occupied Starscream’s processor proved to be a stronger impetus than a wish to punish his first, last… and only, errant prisoner. The Seeker could be as creative with punishments as he was with any problems he set his processor to, and those sharp heels starred quite a few times in Optimus’s darker dreams. Shifting as much as the chains let him, he settled back to watch what he still could from the world – Seeker heels clicking and pattering on the marble floor as Starscream started back to his walk, the rhythm of their music once again uninterrupted in the golden chamber.


	2. Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic was written as a oneshot and I didn't intend to continue it. But for some reason, the world-building seemed incomplete, the scenario so unlikely that I my mind tried to build up a backstory behind it, to see if I can make it... make sense. So I tried. The fic isn't going to be much lighter than it is now, but at least it won't be much darker either. On top of it, I still struggle with keeping the whole thing in TF:Prime universe so if I fail in that somewhere, I apologize for it. I will use some OCs and mechs not normally in TF:P though - that is intentional.

The pattering of heels died down as Starscream left and the grand chamber was enveloped in silence again. Optimus waited patiently, nearly apathetic by the end of the seemingly eternally long day cycle. The Seeker was apt watching him and often returned if he saw his… pet… act differently from what he demanded. The silence of the chamber grew softer as the outside skies darkened, gently hiding the corners and nooks in shadows. Optimus knelt unmoving on his spot, observing the slow but inexorable crawl of the shadows as they swallowed the glint of the polished floor… and finally, when they consumed everything and blackness reigned supreme in the chamber, his clue has finally came.

Two bright reflectors came on from the vaulted, high roof, dispelling the darkness from two distinct spots, illuminating the two frames alone in their respective pools of warm yellow. The dead gray of Megatron stood out starkly in the bright light highlighting his death, while his own red and blue came alive with it. His optic shutters narrowed and the sensors reset to adapt the sudden change in the light levels, but Optimus still waited patiently, unmoving, silently bearing the aches and pains of so long motionlessness. 

A small, many legged drone skittered from a hidden door across the chamber, breaking the silence. Its small, pitter-patter noises were far less than the sound of the Seeker heels, but in the silence they felt much louder. Optimus’ optics followed the small form on its preprogrammed path, the small drone fitting completely in his much-limited world-view. At first it encircled the still frame of the deceased warlord and satisfied with its condition it did the same circles around him. He continued to kneel unmoving, feeling the silent scans of the drone, as it paid him far more attention that it did to its previous task. 

Finally, it – _and maybe its master if he felt like watching the monitors_ – felt satisfied with his obedience and the chains fastening him to the floor slowly loosened, giving him some little slack to be able to move. Not much though… he could slightly straighten his back, he could sit back, instead of kneeling, he could straighten cramped legs… but that was about the extent of leniency this orn. Apparently Starscream didn’t forget his earlier _faux pas_. Sometimes, when the Seeker was especially pleased with him he could even lay down and stretch his whole frame out, luxuriating in that long-denied freedom of movement. Not this orn though.

But Optimus didn’t complain, he didn’t even show dissatisfaction with nonverbal signs. Slowly, so as not to tangle the chains he sat back and carefully he started to work out the painfully cramped cables, the nearly rusted-together joints and loosen his armour plates and protoform. At first his limbs just trembled and barely obeyed his mental commands, but he was patient… and he had all the time in the world. In a joor or so the joints moved and turned again with minimal complaints, the pain of the cramped cables was mostly gone and he sat there, quietly and a lot more comfortable in the silent-again chamber. 

The drone – _and maybe Starscream too, he never knew for sure_ – was watching him with infinite patience as he rid his frame of the effects of enforced immobility. When he was done, it scurried closer again and deposited a small cube of energon in front of him. Optimus waited until it retreated again, before carefully reaching out for the cube. Its contents usually marked Starscream’s judgment of him during the light cycle, so he didn’t expect much… but surprisingly the small cube was nearly full of good quality mid-grade. He savored every sip, drawing out the refuel as long as he dared – _the small drone’s single optic was still observing him, the Seeker might be doing the same from his berthchambers…_ but he had the whole dark cycle ahead, alone, in silence and only his thoughts as company.

With some regret he deposited the empty cube to the very spot it was set before and the drone – _automated or given comm instructions?_ – scurried at once to pick it up and store into its subspace, leaving immediately. Optimus’s glance followed it out of the circle of light, and his audials did the same with the slight noises its legs made on the floor until it left the chamber. He shifted a little once more, trying to find the most comfortable position – _considering his circumstances of course_ – but not too much. Too much movement might mean the drone returning threateningly, the outside guards entering or… or in extreme cases even Starscream coming back with madness-tinted fury surrounding him. And that he definitely didn’t want.

But as neither of those unwelcome scenarios happened, Optimus settled down for a much needed recharge. Not a comfortable one, as he needed to keep some subrutines online to maintain the sitting posture but adequate. He hoped that the fluxes didn’t come this dark cycle, but they were as tenacious as Starscream himself and rarely left him alone for a full dark cycle. Sighing inwardly and shuttering his optics, Optimus let the recharge protocols activate.

-o-o-o-

_“It is all your slagging fault!!!”_

_The screech was so shrill it acutely hurt his audial sensors. Optimus winced both from the sound and the sentiment. He couldn’t dispute it. It was his fault and it didn’t help a single bit his conscience to point to a deactivated frame opposite to him and say that it was his too. Starscream screamed at it nearly as many times as he did to Optimus, not caring a single bit that Megatron was well past hearing the accusations._

_“You could have finished it far earlier!”_

_Yes, he could have. Or Megatron could have. And so many mechs would still be alive, so much knowledge would not be lost, Cybertron would have been restored faster… and so many things would have happened differently. It was all true. He had much to atone for… and he shouldn’t be discontent that it was **Starscream** of all mechs who imposed the punishment for it. _

_“YOU led them to deactivation!”_

_The greavest and most painful accusation - but fortunately not fully true. Some have survived his last, perhaps foolish attack. Too many have perished and it was his fault, a painful weight on his conscience, his gravest sin. Not that Starscream truly cared about their deactivation, not really. Only for one. But that one was enough to spurn the Seeker into a madness he’d always been close and cause him to do the unthinkable… and in the meanwhile, end the war, destroy Unicron and restore Cybertron._

_It was ironic, really. What Optimus Prime and Megatron couldn’t achieve with their united teams and Vehicon armies – one Seeker, a scorned, hated, belittled and all too often called coward Seeker has accomplished alone. He didn’t even mean to it, as Optimus knew quite well. He was just furiously mad and Pit-bent on destroying the two of them. Unicron… Unicron just got in his way really._

_“You pitiful excuse for a Prime!!!”_

_The broken, bent spark chamber throbbed in remembered agony. It never healed since then, reminding him with every painful beat what had happened. The Matrix was torn out violently from it… he should have been deactivated then, Optimus knew. Maybe his continued existence was Primus's final gift, a bitter, dark one at that so he could pay for his sins at the servos of the grieving Seeker, his unlikely successor._

-o-o-o-

Optimus groaned silently as the flux rose and ebbed in his processor, tormenting his meta with its accusations that were at least half true, weighing heavily on him awake and in recharge. Starscream’s voice was sheer punishment while awake too, but when in recharge, it acquired an ominous, stentorian quality, while retaining its shrill unpleasantness too. The Matrix changed him in unexpected ways. He remained the Seeker he used to be, he acquired a sharp, cutting wisdom that together with his terrible intelligence was sometimes chilling to hear; but it didn’t make his tone or behaviour any more bearable. 

But that was perhaps just the edge of madness that descended on him at that fateful orn.


	3. Day

Optimus was roused from recharge the very klik the light blinked out, draping him into cold, predawn greyness. The silence was complete in the darkened chamber until he moved, shuffling unwillingly up, assuming his expected position before the chains tightened again. A few times at the very beginning he wasn’t fast enough and paid for it with tight and tangled chains cutting off circulation completely, causing him unbearable agony all through the day cycle. Since then he learned a lot how to cope. Learned to anticipate his conditions, Starscream’s actions and moods – so his continued existence would be a little less painful.

By the time dawn flooded the throne-room with its young, fresh light, he was the same kneeling, humiliated statue as he was expected to be every orn, vision firmly limited down, to see the floor only and the pedes of other, more fortunate mechs; waiting eagerly and apprehensively his Lord and Master. The Seeker usually came with the dawn, his slender frame nearly dancing on those high heels, the jubilant exhilaration of the morning flight rolling off of him in excited waves that even he, a grounder could perceive. But this orn Starscream was late. Cybertron’s new Sun already glanced in among the slender metallic pillars and the rhythmic tapping of his heels still didn’t come. 

Instead of the Seeker’s own entrance, the elaborate doors opened up at the far end of the chamber, admitting more light, noises and different pede-steps. Optimus groaned inwardly. He recognized the noise, the rhythm of it. Guards, a great many more of them than usual marched in, all Seekers, all armed and took up their positions. Settling around the throne of course, fanning out ceremonially towards the side walls – and encircling the two frames that dotted the floor equidistant from the throne and each other. Optimus slumped imperceptibly in the chains and his optics faded out a little. Open courts were rare but they were the worst for him. 

Starscream rarely ever welcomed the remaining Autobots into his court, preferring to rule them through Ultra Magnus, letting them manage Iacon more or less as they wanted. It was something Optimus appreciated not only because it meant relative freedom for them; but because to see them – _or rather their pedes as it was all he could now_ – was very hard on him and extremely embarrassing on them. The Decepticons, and their occasional jeering, derisive comments he expected and none came as particularly surprising. The Autobots and their futile pleas for him, their embarrassed, guilty and ashamed movements as they tried to gamely ignore his presence, his fate while being extremely aware of it – that was awful to see, hear and feel. 

Starscream flat out dismissed any plea concerning his fate or conditions and banned any Autobot who presented such petitions to him from his court for vorns. Optimus silently prayed silently in those first vorns for his Autobots to stop it. It was more humiliating than the chains themselves, it was never to be granted and it caused Starscream to be in a bad mood for orns. The orn when Ratchet first appeared with a petition and did not mention him at all during it was a relief – even thought it came with a heavy price later, the mocking, derisive words from Starscream, that hurt all the more because they were true... 

Mechs approached now, many of them, their chaotic clatter a far cry from the orderly steps of the guards and the musical, rhythmic pattering of Starscream. They flooded the throne room, milled around in the allowed spaces, talked, chatted, gestured, plotted and planned, enthusiastically played their courtly games… after so many vorns very few of them paid any attention to the silent, grisly decorations of the throne room. Mostly the Autobots, they still did… it took Optimus some time to recognize them from their pedes as they weren’t the parts he used to see of them. 

They would unobtrusively make their circles around the great chamber, politely making their rounds among the more influential Decepticons… but every round took them closer to his limited horizon, every time their steps would slow down imperceptibly, the points of their pedes would slightly shift towards him before jerking back to their previous course… they could never come too near of course. After the incident early in his reign, Starscream took care that the guards discouraged any mech coming close to him. Them. Optimus was in a way, kind of… glad for this protection. The posture he was forced into gave him complete vulnerability and Decepticons at first used that opportunity among the throng of mechs to abuse him with more than words. 

They forgot that Starscream was extremely possessive too of his… _toys_. The nanoklik he noticed the goings-on, the Cons responsible – _Vortex it was that particular time and Wildrider helping him_ – were in for a serious punishment of their own. It was vicious enough so that ever since the abuse was limited to hissed, humiliating comments and cruel taunting. The guards’ presence since stopped that too. Mostly. Unfortunately it also stopped the kinder words whispered in support or comfort – none dared to defy Starscream, not his Autobots who were in a more precarious position anyway. 

The Seeker, who has just arrived and the crowd eagerly gravitated towards him like iron filings would towards their magnet as he threw himself carelessly onto the elaborate throne and flung high-heeled pedes randomly over one carved armrest. Sometimes the Seeker Prime was all for etiquette, formality, pompousness and decorum… but apparently this occasion was not one of those. Optimus listened carefully for the minutiae of his tone, his words that would betray what mood he was really in; for Starscream never showed fully how he truly felt - but expected the most intelligent mechs to guess his hidden moods and intentions.

It was why Ultra Magnus never came to the open court. He was hopeless in this situation, while one-on-one with Starscream over the comm he could manage to achieve nearly everything they needed. But he wasn’t shrewd and devious enough for Starscream’s courtly games. Very few of his Autobots were really. He himself wasn’t good at it… at least before he had to, before he was forced to learn what every minute break in speech meant, what every twitch of those heels signified… for Starscream was, as he had intended to be, not only the center of his world but the totality of it. He depended on the Seeker’s whims completely and so he had to learn to guess them accurately. 

“Silence!”

Thundercracker’s deep voice boomed over the helms of the assembled mechs and they were used to it enough so that silence fell almost at once to the throne chamber. The mechs fell into the rough semicircles that were dictated by power, wealth, rank and most importantly by their current favour with Cybertron’s ruler, Starscream. He wasn’t paying a lot of attention to the proceedings, Optimus observed by that little, absentminded swing of the heeled pedes dangling from the throne’s armrest. Maybe he was still preoccupied with the problem that took up his attention the previous orn so much that he didn’t even punish his slave for disturbing his concentration? Or just bored by the emptiness of the court and the duties of his rule?

Knockout was the first to step… or rather his brilliant red legs sashayed up to the throne the way the Decepticon medic often did and he bowed shallowly. The silvery heels tensed for a nanoklik and Optimus almost saw the frown at the Seeker’s brow plates. The vain medic dared quite much most of the time, testing the limits of Starscream’s often small patience… but maybe he was truly an occasional visitor in the Seeker’s berth and that gave him the privilege of being… nonchalant. 

“Lord Starscream...” – he started on a smarmy voice that was as insincere as it was beautiful to hear.

He didn’t really need anything, Optimus knew after only a few sentences. He was just here to assure his place and privileges, to reap them from mechs eager to climb higher with his supposed help. But he went somehow wrongly about it this orn, or just Starscream wasn’t in a mood for his peasantries, because the shrill vocalizer cut the easily falling words with a cruel sword and Knockout hesitantly took a small, nearly insignificant step backwards. 

Nothing was insignificant in Starscream’s court. 

“What do you want, Knockout?” – the voice eased into a dangerously low, purring cadence and the heels rapped harshly on the floor as he set them down. – “If it is to just waste my time then you should think twice.”

“No, of course not, Prime Sir, I wouldn’t dare to…!”

Optimus twitched minutely. That word could still hurt when used at someone not himself. Not that he wished the position back, not that he wanted the Matrix again… but the wound never healed and that title always made it jag with remembered pain.

“Then state your problem, Knockout!”

“Lord Starscream, it is… it is the matter of the… those beasts…”

Optimus pulled himself together to appear smaller. Or tried to. Bad idea, Knockout, really bad to mention the Predacons to an already irritated Starscream. The beastformers resolutely remained outside his rule, not accepting the title of Prime any more than they accepted the Seeker himself as Cybertron’s ruler – which was none. Predaking was known to make serious – and vicious – threats towards Starscream, though he did realize the inequality of forces between his few living Predacons and the rest of Cybertron united under the Seeker’s rule - and the threats never materialized. But they were still enough to put Starscream in a foul mood.

“What about them?”

Ohh, he could growl. How that shrill vocalizer was capable of that, Optimus wasn’t sure… but he definitely could. But he missed the next few words, for a particular pair of pedes came closer, nearly to the invisible line the guards marked around him and though it appeared to turn away from him, towards the throne, like everymech else’s… but Optimus still recognized it and it was enough to ignore the Decepticon medic’s lame attempts to extricate himself from the tight situation he got himself into.

The immaculately polished white pede with the black trim was one he rarely saw in the court. In fact it was one he rarely saw before either… Prowl was a fixture of the past and after the war broke out he had disappeared into parts unknown in the Galaxy, turning up again only after the… well it was a peace. Even way back then, Optimus wasn’t sure how to act with the stiff, prim Enforcer who always appeared to look down on the young archivist-turned-Prime, who used to be, on top of everything, Megatronus’s secret lover and supporter. 

Why was he here now? Surely not for the court. Optimus tensed his neck, pulling the chain as much upwards as he could, twisting his neck a little to look higher. He didn’t achieve much, seeing him maybe up till the white hips instead of the knee-joints, which was not much of an improvement. Prowl stood relaxed and normally, seemingly watching the dressing down of the Decepticon medic, along with everymech else… including the guards. But the Praxian, while appearing to be prim and proper, was still very much focused on him, instead on the centermost spectacle. 

“Do you wish a rescue attempt?”

At first he thought the question was just created in his fantasies, but then the whispered, cautious quality of it was realized. Prowl stood at a point on the floor where his quiet, almost inaudible voice carried to Optimus only and not to one mech else. He still couldn’t quite believe it. But Prowl’s unbelievable risk-taking – and it was a grave risk should Starscream discover about it - deserved an answer. Would he want to? Would he want the Seeker’s ire descending on the Autobots again, would he want a war to break out again, this time with the Prime on the other side? Wouldn’t Prowl of all mechs be unable to deduct what such an attempt would entail?

Questions and doubts swirled chaotically in his processor, so unused after vorns gone to actively think, to work on problems. Prowl’s pedes stood there patiently, like he was concerned by nothing else than the audience continuing in its usual manner after Knockout’s failure, mechs stepping up one by one and leaving satisfied or with badly hidden frustration… only, by this time all optics were riveted to the center, hungry for the excitement, for the trouble of one that meant a possible rise for others in Starscream’s fickle graces… leaving them opportunity and time to think. Maybe… maybe Prowl had arranged it to be so. 

His helmshake was nearly invisible, but Prowl didn’t miss it. A single, sharp invent and a pede twitching out of character told him that the former Enforcer indeed saw his answer.

“Why? We could arrange…!”

A guard finally tore his optics from the centermost spectacle and his low growl told them that he perceived something from the communication; if not the fact itself, then a suspicion. Prowl smoothly glided away, his pedes showing that he didn’t for a single time look back. He had his answer, Optimus thought bitterly, they all had. They shouldn’t even asked him for it. He would not risk another war, not if they had a far larger army, not even if the Predacons joined, certainly not for just his own freedom. Not only would it be foolishness and hopeless, but it wouldn’t worth it. Not even a victory, which would be far-far away, while another bitter war would surely ensue. 

More casualties, more ruins, more mechs, devastation and loss on his already heavy conscience? Fighting against whom the Matrix has accepted as Prime? No. Slumping slightly, Optimus tore his attention from disappearing white pedes and turned back to the center of his world. Starscream, in the middle of a grand speech suddenly flashed a look towards him, that heavy, terrible attention turning to regard him for a nanoklik fully, heavily, weighing him down to the ground… before he continued, like nothing happened. But Optimus knew that he suspected something… and by the end of the orn he would know. In one way or another.

He rightly feared as the throne room emptied joors later, satisfied and angered mechs left in groups and pairs, some alone, like Knockout, the medic falling from favour into disregard in a span of a mere breem. While the guards turned on their heels, saluting and leaving in an orderly clatter of pedes he knelt and waited. While silence reclaimed the chamber and the sunbeams on the floor coming from among the pillars moved from one side to the other… he waited and watched. Starscream didn’t move either. He continued to lounge on his throne, the little crown he used to wear now in his servos, taloned digits playing with the jagged circlet and he kept uncharacteristically silent. It quite frankly unnerved Optimus more than any amount of shrieking insults and accusations.

When the Seeker suddenly heaved himself onto his pedes he twitched, the chains softly twinkling around him, in a counterpoint to the stark knock-knock of the high heels on the floor. Starscream walked leisurely, meandering around in the chamber, going in and out of Optimus’s nervous worldview. He picked up various objects, examining them absentmindedly and settling them down again, looked out of windows and played with energon treats…giving the indication of nonchalant, lazy thinking.

But Optimus knew it better. When truly lazy and thinking little of important things, the Seeker moved very differently, the heels softly pattering on the polished floor, their rhythm relaxed and slow. Then he could settle calmly into the chains and relax too. The lazy-otiose Starscream was a harmless Starscream. Too bad he rarely ever had this attitude. It was just a façade this time too. The heels clacked on the floor far too hard, the steps were purposeful and long, the apparent laziness stilted. 

And the meandering path took him around himself far to many times, disappearing behind him in a worrying way. The knowledge of what game Starscream was playing didn’t deter it from working. Tensing a tiny bit more every time the patter of heels circled behind him, Optimus tried in vain to see more, to have a little forewarning of what the fragging Seeker was going to do. The more Starscream drew out the nerve-wracking suspense, the more it twanged on his nerves. 

When the noise of steps silenced right behind him, the accumulated jitter nearly crawled on his tightening back-plates. The silence drew out for some more breems – Starscream had as much time on his side as he wanted to and knew its effect, the rising nervous tension in his… slave. The Matrix gave the Seeker the patience he formerly lacked to see his plans and plots through – much as Optimus hated it when they were on his expense.

“It’s almost too funny to know what they plan… when _you_ don’t.”

A buzz rose in Optimus’s audials, nearly hazing over Starscream’s last words. Of course the Seeker Prime would know. He had mechs, audials and optics everywhere… and he had Soundwave. 

“Should I tell you… before or after I thwart their plans and punish them for it?”

Optimus slumped forward, a pained reaction as much as an attempt to escape the still unseen Seeker who was standing ominously behind him, looming over his kneeling frame. Worry ate his processor for the plotters, whoever they were, whatever their plan was. But even in the heightened sensations of nerves, worry and the everpresent pain he acutely felt Starscream’s field touching him and his smug satisfaction felt like a cruel knife on his sensors. 

But no matter the pain and worry, his sensation-starved, immobilized, nearly atrophied sensory system interpreted the closeness and the touch of his field as _good_ … good in a way he didn’t want to, didn’t welcome… but it still felt like energon-balm and though he steadfastly refused to name it such, it was still… _pleasurable_. Trembling shudders wracked his frame and his field yearned towards the contact, though he tried to restrain it, hold it back, keep the remains of his dignity… _what dignity, had he still got any of it?_ No, came the agonized answer and no mech touched him for a vorn at least, no field mingled into his, no sensations were allowed… and while in his ornly, miserable existence he could ignore the yearning, pushing into the back of his processor… still it was there and Starscream knew it and used it for his revenge… _revenge_?

“But you’ve been a good, little slave…”

He purred in that awfully sweet tone that he hated… no, loved it, loved it when it caressed his frame from so close; loved and hated equally. Tremors shook him as the purring dissolved into his armour, the Seeker now so close behind that his voice vibrated his plates and his hot ex-vents blew over his sensors. Optimus realized that his own fans started up, their dusty wheezing an ugly counterpoint to the purring, sweet quality of Starscream’s, their working itself a shame on his conscience…

“Do you deserve a little reward?”

He didn’t want it! He didn’t want _this_! But his frame betrayed him and yearned towards the only one who _could_ touch it, who _would_ touch it, who would give what he himself denied to him…

“I do believe you do…”

Again, the purring, the maddening, awful, sweet and sour vibrations that played havoc with his processor. He should have more resistance to it, Optimus thought through the haze on his processor. He should still worry about what Starscream planned to do with his friends and not yearn for the Seeker’s touch like a cheap buymech… 

“Don’t worry, Optimus… don’t think. It is not your problem any more…”

No, it wasn’t… it should be, but it wasn’t. He was out of it as completely as the Seeker could make his isolation and he did a whooping good job of it. He heard everything that happened in the court and he still knew nothing of importance, nothing that went on under the surface, nothing of why and why not mechs did things in this new Cybertron. He wasn’t responsible for anything any more. 

“That’s it, don’t overthink it… keep your processor where it should belong.”

Meaning… on him. Optimus writhed in the heady field suffocating his senses and the fight to keep or discard responsibility and wanted to whine, while grateful that he could not issue such a degrading sound. But the tension that was nearly tearing him apart was too strong, too much and giving in to the Seeker, giving up everything was so… unthinkable… but his own field betrayed him and spread out hungrily towards the Seeker, who laughed, throatily and sweet, cruel and magnanimous knowing that he had all the cards, all the reasons and his victory was already a foregone conclusion.

“Good mech…”

The claw touching a specific point where it always did on his backplates was like fire and lightning; a dagger biting into him and the softest oil caressing his protoform… chains creaked as he bowed his back towards and away from the touch he wanted and wanted to push away… but he couldn’t. It rested there for an eternally long klik, like always and then started its slow, lazy path over the empty, desiccated field of his back. 

Wherever it went sensors lit up in joyous excitement, sending jagged stabs of _pleasure-pain-shame-joy_ into his meta. Digits curled up and bit into his palms and his mouth opened into a silent moaning groan, echoing in his processor. Starscream’s field suffocated him completely now, coherent thoughts frayed and fled from his meta, replaced by controversial, fighting feelings of pleasure, pain, shame, apprehension and pure, unadulterated joy; all equally strong and finding their battlefield in his processor. 

And the only contact between them was still just a single, needle-sharp grey clawtip, dancing its dangerously pleasurable way across the broad expanse of his backplates. 

“You know… I might even let them play heroes.”

The clawtip wandered up on his backstruts, and jumped onto the right stack, making him bow again and the chains creak ominously. Optimus desperately tried to collect his fleeing thoughts to hang on to the words. It was hard, harder than anything he’s done lately, swamped with the charge that shouldn’t have collected so easily, from so little contact, from just a single touch really… but it did and it derailed his thoughts every time a new sensor or node was fired by the talented clawtip. His fans were blowing hot air out in their highest settings already and his frame was shaking so much it made the taut chains twang and creak at the fastening points.

“Let them pay the price for it of course.”

He managed to collect himself with a heroic effort and shake his helm desperately a little, pushing the trembling plea into his field so Starscream would feel that it was not just helpless, pleasured tremble, but a pleading not to do it, not to let them plot and act and then punish his friends…

“Still playing the noble Prime, Optimus…?”

The clawtip lifted, the warm-soft-caressing field withdrew with the disappointed, sharp-edged tone and Optimus was left alone for a klik, alone, able to think… and swamped with so much unresolved charge, so much terribly and frighteningly _alone_ , so much so it acutely hurt. He shouldn’t reach out for the Seeker to finish what he’d started, he should think of his Autobots… but where they still _his_ and were they still _Autobots_? And was he _theirs_ and should he _care_? Why should he worry about what he could do nothing… nothing at all? 

“…or you’ve learned by this time not to?”

Oh yes. He had learned. He knew better than assume what Starscream didn’t want him to. He was not a Prime any more, not more responsible and not theirs. He was… _Starscream’s_. Helm slumping a little in defeat, he pushed acknowledgement into his field, a silent acceptance and resigned defeat. He let his arousal, his charge call out for the Seeker, let his ashamed acquiescence convey what Starscream demanded from him. 

“Yessss…”

The claws returned, this time not just a single one, but all those sharp, dangerous weapons danced on his frame, the Seeker’s victorious field slammed into his tired, unspent and aroused one like a wrecking ball. He lasted mere kliks under the pleasurable onslaught, sparks jumping form his plates, cables tightening and silent, soundless moans falling from his lipplates… Starscream was affected too a little, his field roiled around him aroused but he still kept his nerves as he drove his captive to overload by mere touches and vibrations.

Optimus roared and he thought he even heard it, it was so loud in his processor… and slumped in the chains limp, all his strength spent and all his higher processor functions gone in the blaze of glory, resetting furiously. Later, he would feel terrible; from overtight chains and cramped cables to guilty conscience and the bitter taste of defeat… _again_ , as Starscream has always won in their battle of wills. But for now he floated in the pleasured haze of being touched after so long and caressed… it worked so well, because it was so rare. He had no defenses. None. 

Just how the Seeker wanted him.


	4. Night

Starscream didn’t linger long, though Optimus wasn’t quite himself for a few breems at least, so he didn’t know for sure when the Seeker left. Slumping on himself on shaky limbs, as much as the chains let him, he vented heavily and tried to collect himself from the burning feeling of shame that started to envelope him from the pleasure of the touch, the contact… the overload. He hardly fought against it this time. Gave himself up to the craved touch over the concern for his mates, his comrades… it truly burned him now from inside out and he was near crying. 

So many vorns has gone… he wasn’t sure of the time, since his chrono was disabled, and counting the orns seemed so very hard sometimes… but it was many and he was broken more and more as they passed. Starscream played on him like a maestro on his favourite instrument and he was merciless…. He had known it wouldn’t be physical pain that would bring him down and so he rarely resorted to that. Even when he appeared magnanimous, _especially_ when he played generous, the Seeker was calculating and exacting his revenge. 

Exactly what revenge entailed, Optimus was not sure; other than making him miserable and broken, depending on him completely on everything. In those the Seeker was most successful, he thought bitterly as senses came back once more, dumping him into harsh, cold reality once more. Optimus shook heavily as sensation in his limbs became painful again, trembled as he tried to assume the humiliating posture again on limbs that felt heavy and shaky, with cables that felt like knotted-up wireballs…

He was most surprised when the chains slackened suddenly, far earlier than the usual time, giving his aching frame and troubled processor a little respite… it just wasn’t in Starscream to be so… lenient. But he didn’t question it. Lying down on the cold floor shouldn’t feel like the Well itself, but it still did. Optimus shuttered tired, faded optics, for once not wanting to observe anything, not having to observe anything… and continued to shake inside. He couldn’t recharge, not while keyed up by emotions so much, but he could at least pretend.

Memories came to torment him further, bitter, chaotic, unforgettable remembrances. Wasn’t enough on his processor already…? Optimus groaned inwardly, the turmoil inside was inexorably consuming his sanity orn by orn, one step of a time, one by one precious strand of reality he could cope with… present and past conspired against him to shatter his very sense of self and he could do nothing but try to hang on.

_It appeared to be a perfect opportunity. It really did. Circumstances were beside them, the Cons appeared to be preoccupied with their internal struggles… and the last Omega Key was hidden there, in that cave, unknown to them. Or so they’d hoped. That Starscream knew about the Keys, they weren’t aware, the Seeker has hidden this knowledge from Megatron, for whatever reason of his own…_

_The battle was fierce, nevertheless. Scores of Vehicons and Eradicons defended the cavern, even as their masters engaged in pointless squabbling, Megatron, as usual trying to battle Optimus while teaching his Air Commander his place… Optimus sometimes wondered exactly what the Seeker was trying to accomplish, when all he could achieve was increasingly painful punishments. He also mused sometimes how the Decepticons could even function with their leader and his second more concerned by deactivating each other than himself._

_But he didn’t mind the matter giving them opportunities to find, contest and more often than not win the relics, energon and strategic positions. With the last Omega Key they would be able to achieve the ultimate goal, revitalizing Cybertron… but he shouldn’t think that far ahead, when there was a battle raging around and Megatron lifting the fusion cannon at him, while Starscream was worryingly not visible anywhere. Optimus lifted his own blaster, ready to counter Megatron…_

… and that was when the disaster started. Optimus groaned in his dreams, writhed fitfully, the chains rattled around him, not wanting to relive it at all, but powerless in the clutches of his turbulent memories, brought to the surface by Starscream’s _hated/loved/craved/despised_ touch…

_… he had no idea who this mech was. Absolutely none, not even well after the events. Starscream provided no details, just hysterical fits of rage whenever the matter came up and he had to put the puzzle together from tiny pieces over the endless vorns following. Back then he only knew that his shot found white plating instead of black, that there was this huge mech suddenly between them, wings still angled to land when they were crumpled by his shot, flames went up from ignited fuel and his voice a deep, sonorous scream of pain… he lowered the blaster, intending to call Ratchet and help his unwanted target, fix his injuries, right his wrongs…_

_But then he realized that the screams cut out and the huge, red-white mech crumpled to the ground, clutching his chest plates that were a smoking ruin, through which energon gushed out frightfully and a fading blue spark pulsed its last beats. Megatron was aiming for him, Optimus realized with an ice-cold dumbness, if his own shot found the white flier’s wings, then the Tyrant’s had to find the mech as well from the other side…_

_In mere kliks the bright red and immaculate white started to bleed out, before he could do or say anything, it turned grey with a frightening speed. Megatron’s shot was fatal, and it didn’t help his conscience to know that it wasn’t him, that ultimately it wasn’t his shot that caused the death, that those injuries could still have been fixed… but he had no time to realize it back then, no time to move or act. They were both responsible, they were both guilty of killing an innocent, unarmed mech. A wrong one at that, very, very wrong…_

Optimus desperately tried to lock out the tumbling memories tormenting him the thousandth time, to stop them somehow from coming again and again… But in his fragmented, weakened processor, he had no chance but to relive the events fully… _as well you should, forever!_ came the bitter, vicious whisper on Starscream’s voice to seal the wound and cause him to give up and helplessly watch it all over again.

_The white mech’s last, agonized screams just died down into awful, gurgling sounds when another voice shouting startled them again. Starscream’s enraged, madness-tinted screech was their first clue as to whom the fallen mech was. The Seeker went berserk, his grief giving him strength to accomplish what he never could before; Megatron’s momentary surprise and hesitation weakened him enough for the Seeker to get his claws into plates, wires, relays, causing such injuries so fast that Megatron was unable to defend himself properly…_

_It was a carnage really, Starscream very nearly tore apart the much larger, stronger Warlord in a span of mere breems with his bare servos. By the time he turned his madness-bright optics, dripping claws and his energon-splattered, lithe frame towards him, Optimus was still very much in shock. When the avenging Seeker descended on him, he could barely lift a numb arm to defend himself from the shrieking, silvery madness incarnate… the claws tore his chest-plates apart and agony swamped him, he was sinking down on suddenly weak knees while his vision was filled with the fever-bright, flaming red optics that starred for so long in his memory afterwards._

_The rest was, for him, hazed over by pain so strong, he was sure of being deactivated. Starscream must have defeated Unicron, arriving with bad timing, with the Matrix, but Optimus didn’t see it, dying as he thought he was among the carnage, spark chamber torn apart and his life-force seeping out. His last thought was that at least they both paid for their one huge mistake._

_How wrong he was. Megatron paid for it there, once and for all, for the Tyrant was quite dead… but Optimus found himself alive some indeterminate time later, realizing that his atonement has just began._

Burning guilt swamped his fitful processor yet again. Starscream since then made sure to instill the seriousness of his sin into his meta forcefully. If it was revenge, he deserved it. If it was atonement, he would do it. If it was pure madness from Starscream, he would still have to weather it. Why him, why not Megatron… there was no way to avoid thinking of that particular angle. Why did Primus see it fit for him to survive the Matrix torn out and his spark nearly guttering out? Was there something still he could live for, hope for, suffer for?

He didn’t dare to hope. Not any more. The chains embraced him and the darkness slowly swallowed up not only his meta but the chamber too. Dark cycle came and went while he recharged, exhausted mentally and emotionally. The little drone – _and its master_ – saw fit not to disturb his fitful, disturbed, shallow recharge, wrought with fluxes, tormented by memories he couldn’t forget.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that TFP Skyfire is different and the history between him and Starscream is far less developed than in other verses. But it is not denied either, so I used it here as background. I even found a good pic for them on tumbler (I found Skyfire’s seriously awesome, cowboy-style – but high-heeled! - boots particularly delightful):
> 
> http://31.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1d90bSoqU1qef8uwo1_1280.png


	5. Day

Orns came and gone and Optimus’s life settled back into his usual routine of… utter boredom, edged with pain and spiced with humiliation. Time alone gave him plenty of opportunity to worry and fret about what Prowl was planning, what Starscream would do to them, what would it bring to the Autobots… he could do nothing about it, he knew, but the knowledge didn’t stop him worrying. He tried to listen when Starscream talked with his Trine and the few others whom he summoned to the throne room, but neither of those conversations mentioned the topic he so craved information on.

It was intentional, he knew. Starscream’s way of screwing with him, throwing him just enough morsels of hints to start worrying, but never enough to find out anything worthwhile in time. Those, the outcomes were fed to him in the most painful ways Starscream could make them. Though none so far were so important than this… the Seeker indicated that he knew every plan the former Autobots made in regards to himself, observed them somehow… and let them act and fall into his trap. 

It was, as the orns have gone by, more and more frightening. It caused him to tense up during the dark cycles, unable to recharge or relax, awaiting for… for something he didn’t know what, where or when was coming. It was maddening, frustrating and unbearable. It made his already Pit-like existence far-far worse than usual. Straining all the time for morsels of information, snatches of words that would perhaps betray something, any action that would mean … no, not freedom for him, he knew that was impossible with Starscream knowing, but it would be punishment for his friends, his team, his Autobots…

Optimus acknowledged that it might be a personal failing of his that he couldn’t shed responsibility with the title, that he couldn’t stop fretting about others, who were no more his to lead. He tried to. Tried time and time again, when Starscream demanded it, when he himself felt it necessary and sometimes just because it felt right. But he couldn’t, not fully and it always came back in times like this. It was hard to separate from justifiable concern for his small circle of friends; that was personal and titles had no bearing to it. He would feel that forever, no matter what Starscream wanted or tried to instill in him. But the responsibility, the care for all Autobots, because he used to be their leader… that was what he had to let go.

But perhaps Prowl and the other Autobots couldn’t separate the two either. They wanted to free a friend, Optimus, out of concern for his suffering… but they also wanted to have their leader, the Prime back. And Starscream would never allow the first because it would inevitably also mean the second. Quite aside from his personal vendetta for the one causing his grief, he wasn’t going to let the Autobots regain a charismatic leader again, who might unify them, who might gather all who were dissatisfied with his reign and might, one orn… lead them to war again.

He had time to think it over… several times and in any depth he’d ever dare to. His orns became once more of boredom coupled with physical discomfort and mental humiliation, never changing, never deviating from routine… he had nothing else to think of, not anymore. Even Starscream turned up far less in the throne chambers, infusing new levels of worry into Opimus’s processor as he knelt alone in the echoing silence of the shadowed room… with only Megatron’s headless frame for company.

That was the only other topic he could think about, while not particularly wanting to. Deprived of things to do, events to know, he could only dwell on a limited amount of topics available to him. Megatron… was not one of the more pleasant ones. Not that the others were in any way comfortable, but this one worsened over the time as he slowly realized exactly _why_ Starscream choose to preserve the mangled frame of his former leader and _why_ had he felt the need to display it opposite to Optimus. 

Optimus didn’t use to have the memories of Orion Pax. He had known he was that mech before becoming the Prime, he knew the outlines of his life… but in time he came to realize that what he was told about it was very different from the actual events in the young archivist’s life. His brief tenure on board the Nemesis brutally brought knowledge to light that he hadn’t been aware of and it evoked emotions too that he, Optimus Prime felt extremely uncomfortable about. Megatron, for him was THE enemy for millions of vorns and that was that.

That he was also a mech Orion Pax loved was a foreign concept to him, uncomfortable to the utmost. He couldn’t imagine loving Megatron, the mech he knew, the cruel, tyrannical, cold and merciless warlord who wanted nothing more than to conquer the universe and kill him. Since Orion’s memories were forcefully awakened, he knew it to be true in his past… but it did nothing to endear Megatron to him in the present. He found absolutely nothing of the righteous, idealistic, oppressed and above all loveable gladiator in the present-orn Megatron. 

But he was Orion Pax as well. As he knelt on the cold floor, more alone than not, not even with Starscream’s dubiously wanted presence for company… as he watched the gray frame in its majestic, statue-like stillness, he saw more and more it as Orion might have seen Megatronus. It was his, the young archivist’s idealistic view of the tyrant, it disregarded anything he knew of the mech’s cruelty and calculating coldness and saw only the far more favourable past. It probably helped that Megatron was dead, he was silent and did nothing like torturing mechs or killing them. It improved the mech immensely in Optimus’s opinion, sick as it was.

It all elevated onto a new level as he slowly pieced together the story of Starscream and that white mech long ago. The more he realized whom he used to be, the more his tanks sank and his processor felt disgusted with his own actions. By all accounts he heard or learned of, the mech was a purely neutral, peaceful and gentle individual, dedicated to sciences. Quite the last mech he would wish to see dead, even accidentally. His history and exact association with Starscream remained a mystery, though he strongly suspected that the shared love for sciences had to be the angle on which they met and became friends… lovers? Probably that too if Starscream’s behaviour was any indication. Being both fliers probably helped too. 

How their opposing personalities came to be complementing each other instead of tearing them apart, he wasn’t sure, but the similarities with his… well, with Orion’s and Megatronus’s relationship were more than queer. And now they were both stuck with their former lovers’ gray frames to watch, while the rest of Cybertron rejoiced in peace and renewed prosperity. The last victims of the war, causing its end by their unwilling sacrifice… and leaving their surviving partners to mourn and live with the shadows of what they’ve done and the weight on their respective consciences.

No wonder Primus wanted him to see it through, saved him to accompany Starscream in his grief and madness. But to what end?

Heels rapped on polished metal and the pattern of them told Starscream to Optimus’s processor. The ambient light of the chamber rose and the shadows slipped away from their chained frames, bathing them in bright light. The Seeker went straight to the throne, sparing only a single look to his trophies, but sitting down without further action. Optimus tensed, like always these orns when the Seeker came. 

More pedes arrived, the steady clacking of the Seeker guards and a few others, less disciplined, more uneven, one of them stumbling a little… dread started to arise in Optimus’s tank, a premonition of dark tidings to come and he strained to see the most he could. The small group progressed steadily into the chamber, their pedes slowly coming into his horizon as they neared the throne. The Seeker guards were encircling some mechs within their group. Optimus tried desperately to discern the owner of those pedes, nearly invisible among the Seeker heels while dread grew and started to encompass his meta.

“Stop here.”

Thundercracker’s deep voice ordered them thus and he pushed one mech a forward, onto his knees in front of the throne and the ominously silent, deathly still Starscream. Optimus’s spark sank. It was Prowl, scuffed up and servos in handcuffs behind him. The others – he still couldn’t identify them – were probably his accomplices in that plot he still knew nothing about. Silence grew heavier as Starscream lounged on his throne, stilled, controlled anger visible even on his high heels. Prowl wisely didn’t say anything to his defense.

Optimus was tense, far tenser than for a very long time and this time it had nothing to do with the hold of his chains or his enforced posture. It came from inside, where his processor already started to paint him the myriad of different ways Starscream could invent to torture him, Prowl, the others, everyone involved and not… and it went into overdrive as the Seeker drew out the suspense, the unsurpassed master of dramatics as he was. It was something like a breem in reality, but he felt it like a millennia at least before the raspy voice finally spoke up.

“I’d have thought that my _appointed_ Enforcer at least would respect justice… even if those he manages would not.”

Prowl didn’t seem to be fazed, like many in the face of the Seeker Prime’s wrath.

“I do respect justice… but even more so it is the _law_ that I serve.”

“You deny my justice and accuse me of breaking my own laws? Be careful, Enforcer…”

“In most cases law and justice goes servo in servo as they should. It is what all societies strive for.” – he paused for a nanoklik but Starscream didn’t interrupt him – “But I question when personal revenge influences justice and bends the law to his personal use.”

The Seekers shifted uneasily around him, glancing at each other at the bold words. Optimus understood. He didn’t know Prowl all that much, but the Enforcer was a mech of principles and not afraid to speak them. Starscream’s legs were tense, signaling his anger but he still withheld himself and answered to the thinly veiled accusation with words only.

“I meted out punishment for those responsible for an innocent life. It was according to law!”

“It was.” – Prowl acknowledged with a shallow bow – “But no punishment should be eternal.”

Optimus didn’t know what to think. Prowl behaved like he was in charge and not a handcuffed prisoner, caught in something illegal. Starscream wasn’t his usual irate, chaotic self and actually defended his actions instead of ordering Prowl to be thrown into prison or something similar. It obviously confused the guards as well. Something changed in the usual dynamic of a ruling Prime and his subjects routine, something he couldn’t quite put his digits on. 

“Who is to say then when it should end and why?”

“You are the Prime, Lord Starscream.”

Was he trying to play on Starscream’s pride, his self-importance, Optimus wondered. If so, it was a dangerous gamble.

“Let the Matrix’s wisdom help you decide. We ask no more.”

For the first time that orn, Optimus felt Starscream’s attention to turn towards himself. All too often it meant bad things to come, so he instinctly cringed a bit, lowering his optics from the force of the glare. He didn’t dare to hope, he suppressed any seed of it ruthlessly. No way the Seeker would let him go free. Absolutely none. Not for the best orator of the galaxy, not for any amount of sensible, silken or unctuous arguments to this effect. 

Starscream’s servo tightened on the throne’s armrest and suddenly Optimus was overcome the need to know what happened to change him so. The Seeker was completely unlike himself, controlled, calm – even if it was a bit enforced calm – thoughtful… and uncharacteristically unsure of himself. This Starscream he wouldn’t know what he would do. This Starscream was an enigma for him, something he hasn’t met yet. 

“The Matrix…” – he hissed suddenly – “… is more merciful than anything should be with… _murderers_!”

Prowl bowed again.

“Then, perhaps a mixture of mercy and justice is in order…?”

Starscream jumped to his pedes and every mech in the chamber – including Optimus as much as he was capable to – jumped or twitched a little in fright. His heels started their staccato music as he walked up and down in front of the statue-still group following him with eager optics and the still-not-daring-to-hope, but listening intently Optimus. Starscream walked a lot and this, at least was familiar territory. What surprised, no, it outright shocked Optimus was that the Seeker appeared far less angry and vicious than ever before and even less considering the topic that so far has always enraged him. 

The tension started to grow again as the Seeker stayed silent and thoughtful while walking. He gave no orders, so the guards started to glance at each other and to their leader, Thundercracker, unsure of what to do. The mechs within their circle also started to shift on their pedes, apparently also surprised that instead of outright punishment, they were actually considered. It was only the Praxian Enforcer, who superficially appeared calm and prepared to wait patiently as long as it took for Starscream to come up with an answer… or a sentence. 

Starscream’s walk started to smooth out, the pattering of his heels took up again that unique music so much like Starscream. He slowed down too, his field taking up a thoughtful character, one giving a tiny grain of hope to Optimus, hope against hope for… he didn’t know what. But this Starscream would do the unexpected again, he would improvise a solution that would be satisfying and airtight, that would achieve his own goals and demands while seemingly give in to Prowl’s unspoken accusation. This Starscream would not punish or torture.

“He will be banished.”

Starscream whirled and stopped at one end of his path, directly in front of him, optics flaming but calm the same time – but he spoke to Prowl still. He was too close for Optimus to see anything beyond the pedes, but they, too looked furiously determined.

“He will leave any space affiliated with Cybertron and any who meets him will be banished too.”

Optimus was too numb to comprehend the details. His processor buzzed and his spark whirled in its damaged, broken chamber too much for that.

“He will take that frame with him to remind him always.”

The shock in the room was nearly palpable. The guards stared at him with optics wide and uncomprehending, the Autobots among them too shocked to react yet. Prowl appeared stoic, but his field roiled with barely controlled victory.

“Forever.”

Starscream whirled on his pedes, heels drawing sparks on the metallic floor and was gone in a nanoklik.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As to why Starscream changed his processor: the Matrix have been working on him for awhile... and not even Starscream can last long when Primus starts to meddle.


	6. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was struggling a bit with the follow-up chapter to the previous one, when I realized that I was just stretching the story needlessly. It doesn't need describing what exactly happened after. So I gave up writing what didn't need to be written and wrapped up the fic with an epilogue.

Starscream stared at the slab of metal that used to be Skyfire, wings drooping and a familiar burn rising in his intakes. Peripherally he was aware of the monitors, showing the Autobots helping out their former Prime with a stiff Thundercracker herding them to go faster. As much as he wanted to see him suffer still, he couldn’t… and seeing the silent statue of the former Prime has lost the satisfaction it elicited in the beginning. All he could see were white wings crumpling and blackening and that terrible roar of pain… the Matrix whispered its usual, soothing, wordless consolation in his spark, the only thing that really, truly eased the pain. That was the only reason why he listened to its suggestion, why he let Optimus walk away… well, stumble away anyway, the mech could hardly walk on rusted joints.

He stared at the slab, locking out everything from his vision, immersing himself in fonder memories of the past. He didn’t need them any more. One long dead, the other barely alive – they paid for what they did. They could never pay it fully… but the Matrix insisted that he should go on and let them go. The energon-price has been exacted. One dead, one repenting his deed for a hundred vorns. Justice… such as it was has been served.

If only any of it brought back Skyfire… 

The Matrix whispered him to let him go too. That, he couldn’t do, not yet. Maybe one orn, maybe when the pain lessened, maybe now that his revenge was done and the perpetrators removed the wound would start healing.

But not yet.

 

-o-o-o-

 

Organics considered the sight grisly, disgusting even. But then, their dead decomposed and became ugly to sight and senses so that was understandable. Cybertronian dead remained the same as when they died, maybe rusted a little and in a few millenias, the dead metal became brittle. But for the few vorns that have passed, it changed very little. Even mechanoid races found it queer to see a helmless, obviously dead mech in the Captain’s chair when they contacted his ship and soon they became famous as the ghost ship. Though what was ghostly on Megatron’s frame, Optimus wasn’t sure. Ghastly, yes. But he kept it there to remember by, as Starscream ordered, even though the Prime had no jurisdiction over him while he stayed away from Cybertron.

In the galaxy, his ship became known, a permanent fixture of the near-Cybertronian space. He skirted, but never crossed the forbidden border. Optimus wishfully and hungrily gathered any news of the planet he could from nearby space-stations; but he never approached the mechs who avoided him uncomfortably in bars and trading posts. He didn’t wish Starscream’s wrath on any of them, no matter who they were. Organics knew that he paid well for the news they had, for knowledge acquired secondhand from Cybertronians and they were willing to seek out the traders whom he had to avoid.

Lacking any goals, they wandered in space aimlessly, a headless mech and an hollow one.

_Lost Light_ was a fitting name for their ship.


End file.
